A Quantitative Evaluation of Non-Indexed Open Access Journals in Aquaculture Research

ORIGINAL RESEARCH published: 29 March 2018 doi: 10.3389/fmars.2018.00106 Predator in the Pool? A Quantitative Evaluation of Non-indexed Open Access Journals in Aquaculture Research Jeff C. Clements 1*, Rémi M. Daigle 2 and Halley E. Froehlich 3 1 Aquaculture and Coastal Ecosystems Section, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Gulf Fisheries Centre, Moncton, NB, Canada, 2 Département de Biologie, Laval University, Québec, QC, Canada, 3 National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, United States Predatory open access (OA) journals can be defined as non-indexed journals that exploit the gold OA model for profit, often spamming academics with questionable e-mails promising rapid OA publication for a fee. In aquaculture—a rapidly growing and highly scrutinized field—the issue of such journals remains undocumented. We employed a quantitative approach to determine whether attributes of scientific quality and rigor differed between OA aquaculture journals not indexed in reputable databases Edited by: and well-established, indexed journals. Using a Google search, we identified several António V. Sykes, non-indexed OA journals, gathered data on attributes of these journals and articles Centro de Ciências do Mar (CCMAR), Portugal therein, and compared these data to well-established aquaculture journals indexed Reviewed by: in quality-controlled bibliometric databases. We then used these data to determine if Pedro Morais, non-indexed journals were likely predatory OA journals and if they pose a potential threat University of California, Berkeley, to aquaculture research. On average, non-indexed OA journals published significantly United States Enrique Orduna-Malea, fewer papers per year, had cheaper fees, and were more recently established than Universitat Politècnica de València, indexed journals. Articles in non-indexed journals were, on average, shorter, had fewer Spain authors and references, and spent significantly less time in peer review than their *Correspondence: Jeff C. Clements indexed counterparts; the proportion of articles employing rigorous statistical analyses [email protected]; was also lower for non-indexed journals. Additionally, articles in non-indexed journals [email protected] were more likely to be published by scientists from developing nations. Worryingly, Specialty section: non-indexed journals were more likely to be found using a Google search, and their This article was submitted to articles superficially resembled those in indexed journals. These results suggest that Marine Fisheries, Aquaculture and the non-indexed aquaculture journals identified herein are likely predatory OA journals Living Resources, a section of the journal and pose a threat to aquaculture research and the public education and perception Frontiers in Marine Science of aquaculture. Several points of reference from this study, in combination, may help Received: 26 July 2017 scientists and the public more easily identify these possibly predatory journals, as Accepted: 14 March 2018 these journals were typically established after 2010, publishing <20 papers per year, Published: 29 March 2018 < < Citation: had fees $1,000, and published articles 80 days after submission. Subsequently Clements JC, Daigle RM and checking reputable and quality-controlled databases such as the Directory of Open Froehlich HE (2018) Predator in the Access Journals, Web of Science, Scopus, and Thompson Reuters can aid in confirming Pool? A Quantitative Evaluation of Non-indexed Open Access Journals in the legitimacy of non-indexed OA journals and can facilitate avoidance of predatory OA Aquaculture Research. aquaculture journals. Front. Mar. Sci. 5:106. doi: 10.3389/fmars.2018.00106 Keywords: ethics, journal selection, open access, peer review, scientific publishing, science communication Frontiers in Marine Science | www.frontiersin.org 1 March 2018 | Volume 5 | Article 106 Clements et al. Evaluating Open Access Aquaculture Journals INTRODUCTION use questionable peer review practices (Bohannon, 2013), and publish low quality science and/or non-scientific information In addition to dramatic environmental change, the (Bohannon, 2013; “shoddy science indeed, they publish.”— Anthropocene Epoch is also characterized by rapid and drastic Dockrill, 2017). Thus, predatory OA journals can disseminate human societal changes (Ellis et al., 2016). One such societal potentially dubious results that have not received adequate peer shift is the ways that humans communicate with one another, as review, fundamentally threatening principled scientific integrity advances in technology have created a hyper-connected world in (Beall, 2016; Vinny et al., 2016). which considerable amounts of information are available at the Researchers may be naïve to predatory OA publishers (which, push of a button. As such, the ways that humans view and interact for some fields, can be an alarming percentage of researchers; with the natural world and one another in this time of great Christopher and Young, 2015) or can be pressured to publish change can be impacted by the information that they receive and may thus use predatory OA journals as an outlet for and the ways in which it is perceived (Castree, 2017; Holmes disseminating their research quickly (Van Nuland and Rogers, et al., 2017). Unfortunately, however, this hyper-connectivity 2016). For naïve but well-intended researchers, publishing in has resulted in a platform for the dissemination of propagandist predatory OA journals might hinder career progression if hiring information and the onset of a “post-truth era” (e.g., Keyes, 2004; committees penalize researchers for publishing in such journals. d’Ancona, 2017). Thus, now, more than ever, we rely on the Alternatively, unethical researchers can also exploit predatory adequate dissemination and propagation of objectively truthful OA journals to increase their publication numbers by avoiding information on a global scale. Given that science is arguably the rigorous peer review (Shen and Björk, 2015; Berger, 2017), best method to obtain objective truth, the scientific community and such practices can make unethical researchers appealing must endeavor to make scientific information accessible and to hiring committees by increasing their publication numbers. understandable to mass audiences outside of the scientific Furthermore, predatory OA journals can provide an outlet for community if truth and logic are to prevail in the Anthropocene. the publication of research from nations that are often excluded Open access publishing—making academic research freely (intentionally or not) from Western publishing outlets. Indeed available to everyone—has emerged as one tool to make science it is reported that the majority of authors publishing in these more accessible to all by providing universal free access to journals are researchers in developing nations who could better scientific articles. The open access approach can have many use their funds to stimulate research activities or publish in non- benefits. For example, the citation counts of open access articles predatory open access journals (Shen and Björk, 2015; Xia et al., are often higher than those of closed-access articles (Antelman, 2015; Seethapathy et al., 2016; Balehegn, 2017; Gasparyan et al., 2004; Hajjem et al., 2005; Eysenbach, 2006; Craig et al., 2007; 2017). Consequently, predatory publishing practices threaten the Gargouri et al., 2010; Clements, 2017). Open access articles are institution of science, undermine legitimate open access journals, also reported to attract more media attention and increased and hinder progression of the utilitarian concept of open science author exposure (Adie, 2014; Wang et al., 2015; McKiernan on a global scale. et al., 2016). Most importantly, the general premise of open For areas of research that are highly applicable to the access publishing allows scholarly works to be legally accessed public, it is important to elucidate ways of distinguishing by anyone with internet access (although illegal means of predatory OA journals from legitimate journals. One such area obtaining scholarly works blocked behind subscription paywalls of research that has yet to receive attention regarding predatory are available, e.g., SciHub; McNutt, 2016), making scientific OA journals is the field of aquaculture. Since the onset of the information available to those who have historically been Anthropocene, aquaculture (i.e., aquatic farming) activities have restricted (e.g., researchers in developing nations that cannot become characteristic of many coastal regions around the world. afford journal subscriptions, the general public; Björk et al., 2014; Aquaculture is one of the fastest growing food sectors in the Swan et al., 2015). world, providing a source of food for millions of people in both Although there are many benefits of OA publishing, the developed and developing nations (FAO, 2016). Aquaculture approach has been linked to the emergence of so-called activities are also a major component of the global economy, with “predatory OA journals” (Beall, 2012, 2013), which have rapidly an estimated value of more than USD$160 billion (FAO, 2016). increased in recent years (Shen and Björk, 2015). Predatory Furthermore, while capture fisheries have ceased growth (Pauly OA journals are typically not indexed in quality-controlled and Zeller, 2016) the aquaculture sector continues to increase at databases [e.g., Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), Web an astonishing

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